Death of a budding talent in Bengal

On Monday, Ankit Keshri – a cricketer of Bengal died due to an unfortunate and freakish on-field accident. The small talk youngster loses the battle of his life at the Nightingile Hospital in Kolkata. The 20 year old right handed batsman was a former captain of Bengal in the U-19 team in Cooch Behar Trophy. He was also among the 30 probables for the 2014 U-19 World Cup in UAE. He was also a part of U-23 Bengal A side in the CK Nayudu national championship.

It was a CAB’s ODI match on 17th of April at the Salt Lake ground between East Bengal and Bhowanipore. In a nasty turn of fortune, Keshri, the 12th man for East Bengal came on for Arnab Nandi, the Railways Ranji All-rounder who took a break in the penultimate over (44th over).

“Fielding at sweeper coer, Keshri rushed to take the high catch as left-arm pacer Sourav Mondal too tan on his follow through. It was a freak an accident as possible” – Jaideep Mukherjee ( Bengal A Coach) was present at the ground.

After colliding, blood came out of his mouth and fell down unconscious. Batsman Anustup Majumdar and Shivsagar Singh a former Bengal spinner rushed to the spot immediately to attend him. Singh noticed that Keshri had no pulse and also his eyes had rolled back. Understanding the situation, Singh gave him mouth-to-mouth and followed it with CPR (Cardiac Pulmonary Resuscitation). After that his breathing resumed but he was constantly falling unconscious. Shivsagar added that, Mondal’s knee crashed into Keshri’s head and neck region.

He was rushed to the nearby AMRI hospital in the ambulance within 15 minutes. BCCI secretary Anurag Thakur said after the IPL Governing Council meeting that “It was a very unfortunate incident. CAB will look into the matter if there was any negligence on anyone’s part. We will discuss the issue at the Working Committee meeting on April 26 in Kolkata. We lost a youngster.”

Biswarup Dey, the CAB treasurer said that he was informed by the doctors on Sunday that Keshri’s health was stable but he had fever. Specialists were supposed to check him on Monday but he suffered a ‘massive’ heart attack. He was put on ventilator but his fight ended on Monday morning.

West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee was present at the East Bengal tent for 10 minutes where Keshri’s body was taken as he was a member of that team and she said that “I am devastated and at a loss of words to express condolence to such a youngster. I don’t know whether it will be right to offer condolence on such a young cricketer. I just came to see him.” She then gave a call to his brother and family and offered her condolences.

The blame game started as the AMRI CEO Rupak Barua said that “We wanted to conduct more investigations on him like CT angio and other tests but we were not given a chance to treat him because the patient was taken after the club and family authorities signed the risk bond and after which we discharged him,” “He was under treatment at the critical care unit… AMRI had conducted CT scan of the brain and 13 dopplers and wanted further investigation,”

Raj Kumar, the father of Keshri was heartbroken and said: “I don’t know why he was shifted to Nightingale. We always wanted better treatment and his East Bengal coach and officials did all the formalities (of signing the risk bond).”

The match between Kolkata Knight Riders and Delhi Daredevils started after paying a minute respect to Keshri and wore a black band in his memory.